Meat the Truth
The ten hottest years that have ever been measured have all occurred in the last fourteen years. Global warming is the world’s current greatest concern; it’s real and humans are most certainly to blame because industrial civilization has caused irreparable damage. It has been estimated that by the year 2100 the majority of people will lack access to fresh water. So it behooves all governments to identify the greatest producers of greenhouse gases in our society and control them. But what are the sources of greenhouse gases? The answer may surprise you.
Livestock farming causes 18% of greenhouse gas emissions whereas transportation is only responsible for 13%. How can this be? It’s rather simple. When you put together all the methane produced by belching and farting cows, the destruction of the rainforests, and pesticides you get a recipe for disaster.
Factory farms crushed small family farms in the 1950s and made some huge changes to the way in which animals were being treated and prepared for consumption. This includes packing animals so tightly they can’t move and never see sunlight, mutilating chickens by cutting off their beaks so they don’t peck at each other, and feeding the animals with second-rate meal that only serves to fatten them faster.
Eating meat is a luxury that most people are unwilling to give up even though it’s rather clear that its consumption is contributing to the destruction of our earth. For instance, cows have a very complex digestive system, which makes them able to digest plant fiber. To do that, they need a very complex mix of bacteria, fungi, and protozoa in their digestive tract. These microorganisms do not have access to oxygen. What this means is that cows need to produce a key end product, which is methane. Cows regurgitate the food eaten in order to chew it again and this allows the microorganisms to get better access to the feed. During regurgitation, the cows release methane. This is a natural process that occurs in all ruminants. A diary cow can produce 500 to 700 liters of methane per day, which is equivalent to a big gas guzzling SUV traveling at about 35 miles per day. Compared to carbon dioxide, methane is 21 times more potent.
If everyone would simply decide to skip eating meat products for one day, the impact would be huge. That one day could become two, then three, then four, and next thing you know everybody has begun to make healthier eating choices that impact the environment. Watch this film now.
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